Holy Hell
by Rik
Summary: A story on what happens when Reno catches the curse Holy Hell after trampling Aeris' flowers. this is in no way copied, stolen or related to Wrexsoul's story All It Took and all likeliness is purely coincidental.


This is a short story about Reno and the 'curse' Holy Hell that he caught from trampling Aeris' flowers. This story is dedicated to Ian, who I can always count on to have a good laugh with. And to everyone else who wondered just what exactly Holy Hell was.

**Holy Hell**

Reno slumped forward onto the mess of papers that currently cluttered his desk and gave an agonizing groan. What was wrong with him? He never had a hangover as bad as this. His head felt like someone was constantly casting quake3 upon it and any noise made it worse. How much had he drunk last night? Four….six….ten shots? Painkillers. Yes. That's what he needed right now. Lots and lots of painkillers. He forced his hand into movement and searched frantically through his desk drawer. He had always kept a bottle or two of painkillers around for days like this. Where were they now? He glanced around his desk then noticed the brightly colored yellow post-it note, posted to the corner of his mahogany colored desk. And on the offending paper scrawled in his nearly intelligible handwriting was the sentence Buy more painkillers

Rude was doing his best to ignore the wailing of his partner over in the opposite corner. Reno was more likely looking for an excuse to get out of doing the offending stack of paperwork he had sprawled all over his desk. He was going to receive no sympathy from Rude today. The redheaded Turk had gotten himself drunk so now he could deal with the repercussions himself. Instead, Rude focused on his own stack of paperwork, which was nearly complete. A few more and he would be home free until tomorrow.

GROAN

Rude's concentration was broken and quickly decided that if he wanted to be able to finish the rest of the papers then he had better see just what exactly Reno was moaning about.

"Keep it down."

Reno slowly lifted his head to gaze in the direction of his partner. He had an annoyed look plastered upon his face which phased Reno none at all.

"I can't help it…I feel like someone is hitting me over the head with a blunt object over and over again."

"It's called a migraine."

"I don't give a shit what it's called I wanna get rid of it fast!"

Rude sighed and dug in his own drawer for the bottle of painkillers he kept for the occasions on which Reno either ran out or forgot his own and tossed the white bottle to him. He smirked when it bounced off Reno's head and onto his desk with a slight thunk.

"Fuck man! Why the hell did you have to hit me with it!" Reno wailed once more and not waiting for a response from Rude tore open the bottle and quickly dumped four brightly colored pills onto his hand, then proceeded to swallow all four together with no water.

"Is that wise?"

"Look if I wanted advice I'd ask you f--- ACK ACCKK"

Rude sighed. Reno was choking. Was it worth saving his ass? He could finally have peace and quiet and be able to accomplish his work on time…but Tseng might wonder what happened. Damn this job and its benefits. Rude slowly got up and made his way to the gagging redhead who was now holding his neck and attempting to either swallow or spit the pills out, Rude couldn't tell which.

"You owe me one." Rude muttered before he grabbed the scrawny man around the waist and squeezed, sending four pills soaring through the air and hitting Tseng squarely in the face. One sticking to his forehead.

Reno having usage of his breathing tube once more began to suck the air in as if it was going out of style while rubbing his neck.

"He was choking." Rude offered to Tseng who was now staring in disbelief and using a napkin to get the offending pill off his forehead. Who knew what it contained? It had been in Reno's mouth after all.

"I need you two to stop fooling around and escort Scarlet to a reactor site. She's looking for big, large, huge materia again and I have a meeting to attend in forty minutes with Heidegger."

Reno groaned. "Aw come on…you know I hate that bitch. Last time she tried getting down my pants I ended up locked in the bathroom of Turtles Paradise for an hour! You know that girl Diane I was trying to get…she wouldn't talk to me! She thought I had a 'problem'!"

"Well she wasn't too far off." Tseng replied with a grin. "No exceptions you have twenty minutes to get to the copter. Reno, don't think about trying anything funny."

"What? Man why do you always say that to me and not Rude!"

"….Was that seriously a question you were asking me?"

Reno growled and slumped into his chair once more. His head still felt like it was going to explode. Oh, man…how was he ever going to get through this day with Scarlet alive?

* * *

"Kya ha ha ha ha ha!"

Reno was seriously contemplating ways to bump Scarlet off. Each offending 'kya' was making his pounding head worse. He wondered if anyone would seriously miss the weapon-loving freak if he were to 'accidentally' push her out the door of the helicopter. Rude seemed to be reading his thoughts however and shook his head.

It had been twenty minutes since their departure from Shin-Ra headquarters and already Scarlet was grating on Reno's absolute last nerve. What was really so important about finding this 'big, large, huge' materia anyway? Sure, he understood that they wanted to use it to make a weapon but after that, it really went beyond him. How far was this site anyway? If it took another twenty minutes to get there, he'd jump out of the copter himself.

"Reno! Pay attention I'm talking to you!" Scarlet yelled as she slapped Reno across the face and simply ignored the death look he gave her. "When I find this big, large, huge materia I will use it to create---"

"The biggest weapon the world has ever seen and use it to bring Shin-Ra higher power.' Yeah, we know. You've only said that four times already!"

"Listen Turk your job is expendable there's lots of qualified candidates we can get to take your place! Kya ha ha ha ha ha!"

Thankfully, Rude interrupted before Reno said something he would most likely regret. "You have to excuse him today Scarlet, he's suffering from a hangover."

"Well shouldn't be going on getting yourself plastered all the time Reno baby."

Reno blanched and nearly threw up. Baby? Ugh.

"Look it's just a headache, nothing serious. It will go away soon."

"As I was saying---"Scarlet continued as if Reno had said nothing at all "I will create the biggest weapon the world has ever seen and use it to bring Shin-Ra higher power! Kya ha ha ha ha ha! Kya ha ha ha ha ha!"

"That's ni---"

"Kya ha ha ha ha ha ha!"

"Uhm—"

"Ha ha ha Kya ha ha!"

"….Right, now it loo—"

"Kya ha ha ha ha ha!"

Reno and Rude exchanged glances and simply waited until they felt it was safe for them to continue.

"Sca—"

"KYA HA HA HA HA HA!"

"Fer the love of----SHUT UP ALREADY!"

* * *

He had been pacing around the site of the Mako reactor for quite some time. Reno had lost track of exactly how long but he knew it was at least an hour. His headache had not gone away like he had hoped it would. In fact, if anything he would say it had gotten worse. He could barely think as thinking required concentration and concentration was not fathomable at the current time. What exactly did he drink last night? Was it possible that someone had slipped something into his drink when he wasn't paying attention? Ugh. He couldn't think about it any longer. It was hurting way too much. 

"What is taking that blonde schizoid so long?" Reno complained.

Rude merely looked over to him from his position against a piece of metal and only shrugged. It was a lot better then being in the office the entire day, he also had to admit that the entertainment Reno provided far beat out the endless stacks of paperwork they were forced to do.

"I say, if she isn't back in five minutes we leave her ass here!"

"You're just mad because she hit you with your own weapon when you told her to shut up."

"We both know you would have done the same damn thing! What was she even laughing about?"

Rude however wasn't awarded a chance to answer because at that moment Scarlet stepped out from the reactor entrance and kicked Reno squarely in the back.

"Kya ha ha ha ha! You're lucky Tseng thinks so highly of you Turk. Otherwise you'd be long gone."

Reno just wanted this horrendous day to be over with already. He should have known that the moment he woke up for work this morning with the intense pain in his head that it was not going to be a good day. Right now all he wanted to do was go home pop a few dozen pills and collapse on his bed and hope to wake up tomorrow headache free. Therefore, he didn't respond when Scarlet made her comment and instead headed straight for the helicopter.

Whatever Scarlet was beginning to say Reno had merely droned out, he didn't have the energy anymore to respond wittingly. He would get his revenge on Scarlet later. He slumped back into his seat and closed his eyes. That seemed to make the pain a little easier to deal with. He wondered what Tseng would say once they landed and he found out what he did. He could hear the lecture already.

* * *

"I thought I told you to behave Reno." Tseng lectured standing in front of the bloodshot-eyed Turk. 

"Man….she just kept laughing and I have a friggin' migraine as it is. She wouldn't shut the hell up!"

"Regardless Reno. She is still your superior and you have no right to talk to her that way."

"Man, whatever. I don't care. I'm going home and you ain't stopping me either."

Tseng merely sighed as the redheaded Turk walked past him and in the direction of the exit. Perhaps Reno just needed some much-needed rest and would be back in the game again tomorrow.

Reno hurriedly made his way towards the exit, every mind to maul anyone that chose to stand between him and the door down. First he was going to go down to the supermarket and purchase the largest bottle of painkillers he could find, then he was going to go home and proceed to down as many as he was allowed and sleep the pain off. Yes this all sounded like a very good plan.

* * *

There was an annoying beeping noise coming from something that was somewhere in his room. What it was Reno could not tell and really did not care either. He had just fallen asleep not ten minutes before it started going off. What the hell was it? He grabbed another pillow and put it over his head hoping it would drown out the annoying noise. It didn't. Maybe it would just stop by itself. He waited and listened, three minutes more and it stopped. Ah. Good now he could get back to sleep. 

Reno had spent the whole night tossing and turning and praying which was something he never did to make his headache go away so he could sleep in peace. It was at six in the morning when it had finally gone away and he finally started to drift off into the wonderful bliss of slumber land when that damn beeping noise had begun. But now it seemed that the beeping noise too was gone and Reno closed his eyes with a smile upon his face.

Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.

Reno's eyes shot open and he glared into the pillow. What the hell was that beeping noise? He growled and threw the pillow off his head and sat up glancing around his room for any object that would even dare set off a noise like that. He couldn't tell where it was coming from, so he stood and started to throw dirty clothes, paper, discarded pizza boxes and whatever imaginable thing that was glued to his floor all over the place. He would find that damn noise even if he had to tear the entire apartment apart, though he hoped that it wouldn't come to that. Well the noise was certainly not coming from his bedroom so he went to his living room.

"Maybe I left the damn phone off the charger…..huh? It stopped again"

Sure enough the beeping noise had stopped. Reno glanced around the living room and spotted his phone was on the charger. Well, what was it then? He had smashed the alarm clock a week ago and had failed to replace it so he knew it wasn't that. The microwave's beeper had died sometime before so it no longer let you knew if you left food inside it. His cell phone maybe? He dug in his pants pocket pulling the aforementioned phone out and noticed that he had had no missed calls. Yet.

"…It's probably those fuckers next door doing something." Reno affirmed dragging his body back towards his bed.

Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.

"FUCKING HELL!" Reno yelled running back into the living room and proceeding to tear that apart as well, he found twenty-five gil buried beneath his couch cushion, and a sock he had sworn a woman had run off with, he quickly pocketed the gil and tossed the sock somewhere else. Under the couch, he found a piece of leftover pizza. It was covered in dirt and cobwebs. Reno brushed them off before popping it into his mouth. Under his end table, he found Tseng's car keys, which he had lost a year ago when he came over for a party and was forced to sleep on Reno's aforementioned couch. The twenty-five gil probably belonged to Tseng.

"Finders keepers boss man."

Searching through his TV stand, he found the tape Rude let him borrow about three weeks ago and a stick of gum-flavored spearmint shoved between the tape of Midgar Beauties and Wutainian Girls Gone Wild.

"Heh, dessert."

What he didn't find however was the source of the beeping noise and it had stopped once again. Reno was beginning to wonder if Rude was playing some sort of practical joke on him. He glanced to his watch and realized that he was now thirty minutes late for work and as if on cue, his cell phone began to ring.

"Ah…shit…" Reno flipped the black phone open and hit the green button. "Yeah this is Reno."

"Reno? Where are you, you were supposed to be at the office thirty minutes ago."

Reno rubbed his forehead and stood up heading towards his room to grab his jacket.

"Yeah I know. I just…got caught up in something."

"Well get uncaught and get in here pronto! I have a mission for you and Rude."

Reno didn't get to respond due to the fact that Tseng had not left him able. Reno cursed as he flipped his phone shut and then headed out of the apartment. Tseng's keys and Rude's tape in hand.

* * *

Reno walked up to the ShinRa building headquarters and searched his pockets for his keycard. Why wasn't it in there? He didn't remember ever taking the card out of his pockets….great. Just great. Well, perhaps he could call Tseng once he got to the sixty-fifth floor. 

He pushed the glass doors open and proceeded to walk towards the glass elevators located on the left. At least he didn't need his card to get up to the sixty-fifth floor. Otherwise, he would have been stuck climbing the stairs.

Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.

He stopped in mid-walk and glanced around frantically searching for the offending beeping noise. Was it something on him perhaps? He searched his pockets again and then began to pat down his chest and body. Nothing. Everything that was on him belonged to him and was not capable of making such an offending noise. Maybe it was someone else he was hearing and it just sounded like the beeping noise coming from his apartment? Whatever. Ignoring the noise, he continued his stride to the elevators and fell short when he noticed a stream of people angrily talking to one another and pointing upwards through the glass. What were they looking at?

"Hey watch it. Turk coming through." Reno said as he shoved past an elderly couple and made his way towards the front of the group of gaggling people. "What's goin' on here?" Reno mumbled and then decided to look up as well.

"….FUCKING HELL!" Reno swore loudly again, scaring the nearest group of people that were standing next to him. There above just between the first floor and the second were the elevators. Stuck. What odd coincidence was this that both of them chose to malfunction at the same time? Reno proceeded to stare at the elevators hoping that maybe one of them would miraculously start working again. Five minutes later, they still hadn't budged and Reno decided that another five minutes would probably result in his job so he turned and headed back outside.

"Now I'm gonna have to take the damn stairs…"

Reno grumbled and turned around pushing through the crowds of people all who were angrily voicing their thoughts aloud and to anyone who would listen. Reno simply did not care what they had to say, most of them were slum residents who were probably above the plate to try to find a better job, a better house…or in short endanger their lives by complaining about it.

"Uhm…excuse me sir….sir."

Reno stopped when he felt a tug on his jacket and he turned to see an elderly woman clutching onto it with her wrinkled, liver-spotted, broken-nailed, pale white hand. Gross.

"Look lady! This suit costs more then your life is worth in gil and if it gets ruined I have to shell out the money for a new one, so hands off!" Reno shook his arm sending the woman stumbling back in shock. "…Damn old people; think they own the entire world just because they were on this damn planet before everyone else." Reno continued to mumble as he forgot the woman and went on his way towards the entrance.

* * *

"I can't…go on…" Reno slumped forward onto the staircase and groaned. His muscles ached, his stomach was growling because he had forgotten to eat breakfast and now his cell phone was ringing. 

"Reno, speak."

"Reno! I thought I told you to get down to the office! What are you doing?"

Reno groaned and sighed. "I'm on my way up right now; did you know the elevators aren't working?"

"Well they were working an hour ago when you were supposed to be in! Get up here now!"

Reno stared at his phone and sighed again. Man the boss was sure pissed at him. Well one flight of stairs down…only nine hundred left.

Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep

"….God dammit!"

Twenty minutes later Reno was standing on the sixty-fifth floor in front of a glaring Tseng, and an amused Rude.

"Reno, are you aware that you are down the path of losing your job?"

Reno flinched at the boss man's anger and gave a dirty look to the few employees that curiosity had gotten the better of, and then responded.

"I can understand your anger, I was up all night with that damn headache, and then when I finally got to sleep this damn beeping noise kept going off."

"I don't want to hear your excuses! You have jeopardized this mission with your tardiness! If it happens again Reno you will find yourself, face down on the street in the sector four slums! Where I found you! Do I make myself clear?"

Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.

"Are you sure you don't hear that…it's doing it again!"

Tseng eyed Reno worriedly, it wasn't like him to be acting the way he had the past two days, however he shrugged it off. "I said do I make myself clear?"

"Clear as crystal sir."

"Good. Now I want you and Rude to go down to Don Corneo's Mansion. There have been reports that he has been abusing the President's hospitality. Talk to him, find out what he is up too….persuade him if that is what it takes, I will be expecting a report at the end of the day. Now get lost."

Tseng stormed off towards the stairs as the elevators were still not working, leaving Reno and Rude in his wake. Reno sighed and rubbed his forehead, Tseng had never gotten this angry with him before and he did not doubt for a second that he meant every word.

"Try to stay on his good side from now on Reno." Rude offered with a shrug of his shoulders before heading towards the stairs himself leaving Reno to follow him.

"Do you think?" Reno replied sarcastically following his partner as the beeping noise started once again. "…Seriously…you don't hear that?"

* * *

Reno had been chasing the fat little man all around Wall Market. Apparently, word had gotten out that he was to be receiving a little visit from Shin-Ra and he had been in the restaurant trying to hide. Rude had decided to find the leak in the system and take care of it accordingly while Reno was assigned Don duty. From the restaurant, the Don had fled to the dress shop and had attempted to dress like a girl and sneak past Reno. It hadn't worked because Reno had been with many girls and Don was the 'ugliest looking thing he had ever seen.' From the dress shop, he chased the Don to the gym where Reno was nearly corned by three guys who kept calling him bubby and asking for a squatting match. They only seemed to listen after Reno had charged up his rod and fried the wig of 'Big Bro'. From the gym, the Don had proceeded to run to the item shop. Wasn't much of a place to hide in there but the Don had managed to slide under Reno's legs and make a mad dash for his mansion. Once inside Reno chased him down to his basement where he stood in shock at the table and cuffs and other various implements on the walls, leaving the Don enough time to hurriedly shimmy up the stairs once again. From the basement, Reno managed to catch up with the Don in his room, which is where the chase had finally ended with the Don on his bed cowering in horror and Reno glaring at him with a mad glint in his eye and charged up electro-mag rod in his hand. 

"Dammit! I'm tired of chasing your fat ass all over the place! I've had one hell of a bad day and right now, I'm going to take it out on you! I don't even want to know what the hell you're doing in that basement of yours!"

"Oh you see with that, it's really interesting, I take gi--"

"I said I didn't want to know!"

Reno grunted. He really hated this guy, and he couldn't wait for the day he finally got to do the fat little bastard in.

"Only a fool that runs has something to hide. Who tipped you off that we were coming, eh Don?"

"I---I don't know what you're talking about!"

"Oh really?" Reno smirked and stepped closer to the Don. "Have you ever known what its like to be electrocuted? In a tender area? How about we experiment and find out for future reference?" Reno grinned and with the same mad glint in his eye began to bring his charged up electro-rod closer to the Don's rather 'tender area'.

"S—stop! Stop! It was an employee on the sixty-fifth floor. Mikey."

Reno retracted his hand a little but still kept it awfully close letting the Don know he wouldn't hesitate.

"So Mikey has been feeding you secrets has he? How much did you pay him off Don?"

"…a thousand gil…each tip off!"

"Really? A high price. We're watching you Corneo. One more slip up and we'll be on you faster then you can do that stupid-assed dance you do. Do I make myself clear?"

"V—very!"

"Good." Reno stood and powered down his rod. "You have a nice day." And with that, he turned and left leaving the Don shaking in a corner of his bed.

Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.

"….AUGH!"

* * *

"So we have an employee on the sixty-fifth floor selling secrets to Don Corneo. Possibly other informants as well." Tseng mused from his desk where Reno and Rude stood before him. 

"It could be possible that the Don is also selling the secrets he receives to other inquiries, explains why he is able to live so cozily in that dump of Wall Market." Reno offered, rubbing his temples, trying to drown out the beeping noise, which had gotten much louder.

"Yes. We'll have to keep a very close eye on him from now on... Rude I want you to take care of Mikey. Reno tomorrow you must be on time for work, we're going to knock down the plate above Sector seven. We have information that AVALANCHE'S hideout is in that sector."

"Good, I'm dying for a bit of action." Reno smirked showing his teeth, while Rude just shook his head. "Oh yeah I found your car keys this morning when I tore my apartment apart trying to find that beeping noise." Reno dug in his pocket, pulled Tseng's keys out, and set them on the desk. "Oh and your tape man." Reno also handed Rude his tape.

"So that's where they went." Tseng sighed then stuck the keys in his drawer while Rude attempted to hide the tape somewhere. "You both are dismissed. I want you to report to me first thing in the morning Reno."

Reno nodded and left with Rude through Tseng's office door.

"You look beat." Rude offered to Reno who indeed did look like he was about to fall apart at any moment.

"…I had to chase that fat bastard all over Wall Market before finally cornering him in his own room." Reno grumbled. "On top of that there's this beeping noise that keeps going off!"

Rude glanced around the office listening for the beeping noise Reno had mentioned. However, he didn't hear anything except the hum of the air conditioner above them.

"…I think you should go home and rest. You're hearing things." Rude muttered and left a disbelieving Reno in his wake. From a ways down he could hear an employee say.

"What! The elevators aren't working again!"

* * *

It was turning out to be a good day for Reno. He had woken up this morning on time, with no headache and no beeping noise. He had reported to Tseng on time (much to Tseng's surprise) for today's mission and was even smiling. 

"Now Reno, this mission is highly important, and normally for something this high of a caliber we would had have Rude with you as back-up, however this situation with Mikey is proving to be harder then we had initially thought, apparently Mikey had left a long trail of informants that know more then they should worry their heads over, and we can't risk them ruining Shin-Ra's plans. So you're going to be on your own for this one. Don't screw it up, a lot is riding on this and I know you haven't been feeling your best the past two days."

Reno grinned and bounced from foot to foot, boredom, excitement, agitation. Whichever it didn't matter to him. "Yeah, I think someone spiked my drink, but I'm feeling better now, this will be a piece of cake, boss man, no need to fret over it."

Tseng sighed. "With you Reno…I fret over everything."

"I'll take that as a compliment." Reno grinned.

"Alright, there's a helicopter waiting for you as we speak, it will fly you to the pillar, all you have to do once there is set up the bomb…I know how you like flashy explosions, and detonate it. We'll have a team of Shin-Ra soldiers backing you up."

"Hey man, this will be a walk in the park."

Tseng rubbed his forehead it was clear that Reno was back to his cocky-self-confident self. "Whatever, Reno just don't goof around up there."

"Aye, aye capn'." Reno saluted with a grin then turned on his heel and left for the helicopter.

"Why do I feel like something is going to go wrong…" Tseng whispered preparing his things just in case.

* * *

"Heh I can't wait to see the explosion this baby makes." Reno mused to himself as he patiently and expertly connected the wires to the bomb and activated the timer. "I told boss man that this would be easy, there's no one here to stop me." 

Of course, Reno happened to speak too soon and he turned around to see Cloud, Tifa and Barrett all brandishing weapons.

"You're too late, once I push this button…" Reno smiled as he did so. "That's all folks! Mission accomplished!"

"We have to disarm it! Cloud, Barrett please!"

Reno was not about to let this rag-tag group that called themselves "heroes' ruin his mission. "I can't let you do that, no one gets in the way of Reno and the Turks."

What happened next was a three on one battle. This hardly seemed fair if you asked Reno, but he had to kill some time so the timer could run down a little. And after five minutes of stunning the team with his rod and encasing them in pyramids, he decided that he had killed enough time and glanced to his watch. "Gotta go." Reno laughed and took off running in the direction of the edge of the pillar.

"Oh hell…this going to hurt" Reno mumbled as his legs which he didn't seem to be in control of propelled him off the side of the pillar. Luckily, he was saved by Tseng's helicopter, which he landed on rather then in and regretted it immediately.

"Reno you idiot! Why did you jump?" Tseng yelled and ordered the two SOLDIERS that were with him to pull the redheaded idiot inside so he could turn his attention to what was going on, on the pillar.

"That's right you'll have a hard time disarming that one! It'll blow the second some stupid jerk touches it!" Tseng yelled over the humming of the copters blades to the three heroes who had given up trying to disarm the bomb Reno had set.

"Please stop it!" the girl he knew as Tifa pleaded with him.

Tseng laughed he was rather enjoying this. "Only a Shin-Ra Executive can set up or disarm the Emergency Plate Release System."

"Shut yer hole!" the black man Tseng identified as Barrett yelled as he began to emphasize his point by firing a few rounds at the copter from his gun arm..

"I wouldn't do that... You just might make me injure our special guest." Tseng yelled over the blare of the ammunition and pulled his 'special guest' Aeris to the front of the helicopter.

"Aeris!" Tifa yelled.

"Oh, you know each other? How nice you could see each other one last time. You should thank me." Tseng replied with a grin. He had found the Ancient running towards her home sector with a little girl. The girl he didn't care about, finally finding Aeris was all that really mattered. How lucky was it that they were able to find her during this mission.

"What are you going to do with Aeris?" A boy with spiky blond hair spoke up for the first time. Tseng had no idea who he was, but he was aware that this man was wearing a SOLDIER uniform.

"I haven't decided, our orders were to find and catch the last remaining Ancient. It's taken us a long time, but now I can finally report this to the President."

"Tifa, don't worry! She's all right!" Aeris yelled leaning out of the helicopter, Tseng could only assume she was talking about the girl she had been with. He didn't have time for this however and slapped her back inside.

"Aeris!" Tifa yelled obviously disgusted by what Tseng had done to her.

"Hurry and get out!" Aeris yelled to her friends once again leaning out the side of the helicopter. This girl was going to cause him a lot of trouble. There was no more time left however to stay here and banter back and forth with a bunch of rebels. He took a mental note to look into the guy in the uniform.

"Well, it should be starting right about now. Think you can escape in time?" Tseng laughed as the helicopter pulled away from the plate as it began to explode, debris flying everywhere.

* * *

Rude was sitting down in a chair next to the bed Reno occupied in the infirmary area of Shin-Ra headquarters. He wondered what exactly possessed the Turk to kamikaze off the side of the pillar. He was lucky that Tseng happened to be in the area, otherwise Reno would be nothing more than a pancake beneath a plate. 

"I couldn't help myself" Reno offered looking to Rude as if he could read Rude's thoughts. "My legs just started running and I couldn't stop them!"

"You've been acting really weird the past couple of days. Did you piss someone off?"

Reno sighed. He pissed many people off in a day, why would he be suffering these strange calamities now though.

"No more than usual."

"Well the boss says you are going to have to take it easy for the next few weeks, so your injuries heal. In the mean time, he has hired a replacement for you. A girl named Elena."

"WHAT? A GIRL IS TAKING OVER MY POSITION?"

Rude smiled. Ah, he liked getting a rise out of his partner it was truly fun to watch. It was even more entertaining when Reno attempted to move out of the bed, only resulting in more pain for him due to the fact that most of his body was in a cast.

"I wouldn't do that Reno."

Reno glared to his partner, Rude only smirked.

"Don't blame me. You're the one that jumped off a pillar and onto a helicopter."

"I said I couldn't help myself! It was like someone else was in control of my body I couldn't stop myself." Reno explained trying to demonstrate what he meant, and only resulting in hurting himself even more.

"Well, she isn't your replacement, she's a new addition, our numbers have dwindled recently to where there's only me and you left, and now that you're out of the picture we needed someone else to help out with the missions."

"What's she like? Is she hot?" Reno grinned.

"I haven't met her yet. But don't even think about it Reno."

"Too late for that."

Rude sighed. Reno was such a man whore.

"I have to report to Tseng, he has a mission for Elena and I. Try not to get too excited and jump out the window. There's no helicopter to catch you this time."

"Why you son of---"

Rude laughed and danced out of Reno's reach giving a small wave to his redheaded friend before leaving him alone to his own thoughts.

* * *

Reno was going stir crazy. He had been trapped in the infirmary for three hours by himself and it was starting to get to him. How long did they expect him to be able to last this way? Didn't they know that he would gnaw his own arm off from boredom? 

"I have to get out of here before I do something crazy!"

So Reno started to gingerly slide out of his bed, being careful not to put too much strain on his battered and bruised body. He'd show them that he could handle himself just fine. Next to his bed was a wheelchair, which had been left there in case Reno ever needed to get up, to use the restroom. Well he was going to use it for more then just that task. Why not a tour around Shin-Ra headquarters? Sounded like a good plan to him.

He slid off his bed and onto the chair. "That wasn't so hard." Reno congratulated himself and proceeded to wheel himself out of the room. He was able to sneak past the nurse relatively easily as she seemed to be occupied with an employee that belonged on the twenty-fifth floor. She was cute; he actually might consider banging her sometime in the near future, after he got out of the cast.

Reno peeked around the side door to make sure there weren't any other nurses hanging about and after affirming the clear, he pushed himself through the infirmary entrance door. Free! So, where would he go now? The building was practically deserted; everyone had gone home by this time or was locked up in their offices finishing last minute details so Reno had the entire building to himself to do whatever he wanted.

He contemplated on where he would go first. Hojo's lab? Well no, that place freaked him out he always had some weird experiment going on down there and he avoided that place whenever he could. Hojo's lab was out of the question. How about boss man's office? He bet Tseng had many interesting things in there that he didn't want his fellow Turks finding out, perfect blackmail could be lurking in the depths of Tseng's office! A gold mine! Reno instantly knew that that would be the ideal place to start out. So he pushed himself towards the elevator and scanned his card key. "What are you hiding in your office boss man, you never let anyone in there unless you're there, there has to be something good you're keeping from me." Reno mused to himself as the elevator silently rose to the floor the Turks' offices were located on.

When Reno finally wheeled himself into the office, it was like a child in a candy store. Reno filtered through everything. He found a stack of notes Tseng left to himself about various things on his desk and inside the first drawer, he found that the boss man was exceptionally clean and tidy. Everything had its place. Paperclips were in a little circular magnetic casing next to the box of staples that sat neatly on top of a pad of post-it-notes. And his pens were all lined up in a neat order.

It was boring Reno so he moved onto the next drawer and found car keys and an extra gun Tseng kept around for safety. He also found a set of hand sanitizer wipes. Tseng's office was proving not to be as fun as Reno had originally thought.

"Man this is boring." Reno yawned going to close the drawer but stopping in surprise when the gun flew into the air and latched onto his hand. "What the…" Reno said staring in disbelief as he tried to pry the gun off his hand. It wouldn't budge. "Is this some kind of sick joke…is his office booby trapped?" Suddenly the top drawer flew open and the paperclips and staples proceeded to glue themselves to his body as well. "This isn't funny Tseng!" Reno growled wheeling himself away from Tseng's desk.

This was not cool. Why wouldn't they come off his body? What was the strange clunking noise? It almost sounded like a shaking file cabinet. ….No…it couldn't be… Reno hesitantly turned his head towards the file cabinet in the corner of the office and paled. It was moving…toward him…

"Ah shit!" Reno yelled snapping around again and grasping the wheels of the chair and wheeling himself out of Tseng's office as fast as he could, the filing cabinet close behind and picking up speed.

"Why me man!" Reno wailed wheeling himself towards the elevators as other objects started to fly through the air and latch onto him. He couldn't believe this was happening to him. He glanced around. The cabinet was now being followed by a desk and a lamp light.

"WHAT THE SHIT IS THISS!" Reno now completely freaking out wheeled himself as fast as he could all the while being chased by the office equipment which refused to give up the pursuit. He ended up wheeling past the elevator and down the stairs instead which, in retrospect he decided as he was bouncing down at a dangerous speed followed closely by objects that probably weighed more than Heidegger that this whole exploring the Shin-Ra building was in fact not a good idea. He should have stayed inside his room and watched TV, which was his last thought before Reno was attacked by the office supplies.

* * *

"So…tell me again why you were in my office when you were supposed to be in the infirmary?" Tseng sighed and trying not to smirk at Reno who had been stapled sometime in the night by a 'crazy stapler'. 

"Look I was bored! I was actually on my way to my office to check something out when I thought I heard a noise coming from yours. So naturally, being a Turk and being trained in the ways of self combat I checked it out."

Tseng found this whole story extremely hard to believe. "And then what happened?"

"Then once I got inside, I realized that your office had been booby trapped. Someone had it out for you, you're lucky it got me instead!"

"So…you're saying someone booby trapped my filing cabinet to get revenge on me in some way?"

"Exactly."

"…Then why did Deidra's desk attack you?"

"Look do I look like a freaking expert on office supplies? I'm just telling you what happened!"

Tseng couldn't help but to laugh at the entire thing. When he had found Reno this morning plastered between the wall and office equipment he had been dumbstruck, but the whole situation turned out to be far better then just amusing. It was hilarious.

Reno grumbled. He thought otherwise. He didn't think the situation was funny at all; on top of that, he was already getting it from the damn rookie they hired yesterday.

"Sir. I think he may have hit his head a little too hard when he fell down the stairs attempting to steal your filing cabinet." Elena said, herself laughing.

"Yes, perhaps we should have his head examined for injuries."

"Oh yeah, it's real funny when the redhead gets hurt but had it been one of you, you wouldn't find it as amusing!" Reno grumbled. It was not turning out to be his week.

"Look, I just find it hard to believe that a filing cabinet would fly towards you like that and then proceed to chase you around the floor!" Elena laughed.

"I find it hard to believe they hired you for this position do you even know how to aim that gun you're carrying?" Reno shot back an angry glint in his eye.

"Want me to demonstrate on your leg?" Elena fired back.

"Alright that's enough!" Tseng snapped breaking the argument up before it turned into a bloody brawl. He didn't want to clean the walls. "Elena please find Rude and tell him I want you and him to escort Scarlet to a reactor site. Reno. Why don't you go home and I'll call you when we need you back."

"Yes, sir." Elena mumbled shyly and quickly ran off to find Rude.

"That's it? You're just going to let her take over my job like that!"

"Look Reno, you're in a wheelchair, what could you possibly do? Run someone down in it? Besides you hate Scarlet."

"That's not the point!"

Tseng sighed and started to walk away, he had an office to put back together. "Goodbye Reno."

"DAMMIT!"

* * *

Reno had watched the same infomercial for wart remover fifty times and could now recite the dialogue by heart. "Do you have unsightly warts? Do you want to get rid of them? Are you tired of miracle creams that promise results but fail to deliver? Are outrageous doctor's fees sending you into the negative? Then zap them away! That's right! Zap the warts away, Zapper Wart. This clinically proven device is guaranteed to get rid of your unsightly warts or you'll just have to live with it the rest of your life!" 

Reno rolled his eyes as he recited the infomercial. Honestly, did these people have nothing better to do with their boring lives? He had been home for a day now and was able to finally walk around. This was what he was doing when Elena poked her head in through the door and announced that she was there to check up on him.

"They always send the rookie to do the bitch work." Reno grinned watching as Elena stepped into his apartment carrying a stack of paperwork.

"Oh please, I wouldn't get all cocky if I were you. Tseng says since you're home and doing nothing---"

"Doing nothing? Hey I am extremely busy!"

Elena rolled her eyes and turned her heads towards the television. "Yeah I see, watching infomercials on warts."

"Hey! It's very time consuming!"

Elena ignored him and continued. "Tseng says you could use your time to finish this paperwork that you neglected to do over the past two weeks."

Reno groaned and slumped onto his couch eyeing the paperwork like a death omen. "You have to be kidding! I'm supposed to be recovering!"

"Your mental problems aren't ever going to be healed. So get used to it."

Reno just gave her the evil eye as she walked towards his kitchen, probably in search of something to drink. Sighing Reno grabbed the first file and flipped it open, it was information on the ancient he had paid a visit to sometime in the beginning of the week. He remembered having to go to her church just to find her and running into a spikey-headed blonde in a SOLDIER'S uniform. Reno did not recognize him, but then again he didn't pay much attention to the employee's that were lower on the food chain. He flipped through it going over his notes on how they climbed into the rafters in attempt to get away from Reno and his group and ultimately how they DID manage to get away after killing off a few of his men. Man that day was annoying as hell. Wait a minute…what happened before all that? Didn't he tell his SOLDIERS not to trample her flowers after he had already done so? What was the comment of one them? "You're going to catch Holy Hell!" ….Of course…

"Reno, do you have anything in this place that's not hazardous to your health?"

"Elena do you know anything about Holy Hell?"

Elena turned and gave him a look that said he was insane. "Holy Hell? What are you talking about?"

"Well…a lot of weird things have been happening to me this week…and they all started after I accidentally walked all over these flowers in a church."

Elena continued to look at him like he was insane.

"Look I'm not crazy! The first day I had a splitting headache that nothing could fix! The day after that I kept hearing this beeping noise and the elevators magically refused to work when I was in the building. The following day I kamikazed off that pillar…which is why you were hired in the first place. Then that night was when I was attacked by all that office equipment."

Elena finally interested had made her way back from the kitchen to hear more of this strange story. "Well…those are some pretty weird things…but what about today? Is anything wrong with you today?"

Reno thought about it. Was anything wrong with him today? No headache, no beeping noise, no random jumps off things, no office supplies hurtling at him. Nothing…

"Er well…no."

"Then what makes you think you were under this curse 'Holy Hell'?"

"Because after I had trampled the flowers, I had turned to tell the SOLDIERS not too and one of them said "You're going to catch Holy Hell!"

Elena burst out laughing. "That has to be the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard! Holy Hell! Come on Reno, that's just a stupid superstitious phrase! There's no way such a thing exists!"

"How would you know? Have you ever caught it?"

"No, but you would be the first moron to claim they have!" Elena continued to laugh, holding onto her side.

"Look I'm telling you that it had to have been that!"

"Okay fine…" Elena said calming herself down. "Let's just say that you did in fact catch 'Holy Hell' why aren't you experiencing anything today?"

Reno thought about this for some time. Why wasn't he experiencing anything today? Could it be that he had broken the curse somehow? Or was it something that only lasted a week?

"I'm not sure…maybe I broke it, or maybe the curse only lasts for a period of time. I don't know. All I know is that I DID have this curse. Nothing else makes sense!"

Elena straightened her suit and sighed. There was no use in arguing with Reno once his mind was set on something. And who knows, maybe there really was a curse called Holy Hell. She felt it better to give him the benefit of the doubt.

"Alright, fine I believe you. But I wouldn't go around telling people that. They may look at you like you're crazy…well you are crazy."

Reno glared at her but said nothing as she went back to his kitchen to continue rummaging through. Holy Hell, huh? Reno thought. He would have never guessed that such a thing existed. Elena was right though, aside from telling Tseng and Rude he probably should keep the whole theory to himself. After all…wouldn't it be fun to watch someone else suffer? And with that Reno grinned and shut the file, tossing it back on top to join the other unfinished paperwork, before following his fellow Turk into the kitchen.


End file.
